Coming off a tough, physical game against Snohomish Tuesday night when the Wildcats dropped their first game of the season 58-39, a tired Oak Harbor boys basketball team took the floor for Wednesday’s non-league matchup against Burlington-Edison.

In the first quarter, it was evident that the Wildcats were about a half-step behind the hard-charging Tigers, (4-1), who opened the game with a 6-0 run and at one point led 13-2 before Rodrick Rumble scored Oak Harbor’s first points from the floor at the 4:13 mark.

“We were a little tired and a little lethargic tonight,” coach Mike Washington said. “Burlington-Edison has a good basketball team and they are very aggressive on defense.”

At the end of the first eight minutes of action, the Wildcats had dug themselves into a big hole trailing 24-11.

In the second period Oak Harbor began chipping away at Burlington-Edison’s lead, outscoring the Tigers 16-9 to shave the margin to 33-27 at halftime.

The Wildcats kept the pressure on and when Eric McCardle nailed the first of his two three-pointers at the 4:25 mark of the third quarter, Oak Harbor had cut the Tigers’ lead to three points, 37-34.

A basket by Burlington-Edison’s Gus Montgomery and a three-point bomb by Jake Anderson gave the Tigers a little breathing room, but when McCardle drilled his second three-point goal and Dallas Heidt canned another with 50 seconds remaining, Oak Harbor went into the fourth period trailing by five, 47-42.

The final eight minutes was a series of runs by both teams.

After Sean Clement scored to put the Tigers up 49-42, Oak Harbor went on an 8-0 run to take a 50-49 lead with 6:09 remaining in the game.

After that, Burlington-Edison went on a 7-0 run to go ahead 56-50 and Oak Harbor was never able to recover.

“We have to be able to make plays and we haven’t been able to accomplish this when we needed to in the last two games,” Washington said. “That’s the thing for us right now, making plays. The guys played hard defensively, but I think we were just out hustled tonight.”

In the waning moments the Wildcats were forced to foul and the Tigers were 10-for-15 from the free throw line in the fourth quarter to nail down the victory.

Rumble led Oak Harbor with a team-high 15 points, Heidt had 12 and Lobbestael was the third Wildcat in double figures with 11.

“We had a big game last night and this team was pretty good,” Rumble said. “There was no slack for us between games. We came back and played hard and I wished we could have come away with a ‘W’. This game taught us we can bounce back and we’ll be ready the next time.”

Anderson scored a game-high 17 points for the Tigers, including a trio of three-point goals.

Oak Harbor travels to Squalicum for a makeup game on Wednesday, and returns home to face Stanwood in a league game Jan. 3.

Snohomish 58,

Oak Harbor 39

Snohomish jumped out to a 17-8 lead over Oak Harbor after the first quarter of play in Tuesday’s WesCo North season-opener for both teams and snapped the Wildcats’ three-game preseason winning streak with a 58-39 victory.

Oak Harbor rallied to trim the lead to five points, 29-24, at halftime, but were outscored 29-15 in the second half as Snohomish pulled away.

Rumble was the only player in double figures for the Wildcats with 15 points.

Tanner Jenkins scored 21, Tim Diederichs had 12 and Stuart Shilling was the third player in double figures for Snohomish with 10 points.

Burlington-Edison 65,

Oak Harbor 55

B-E 24 9 14 18 — 65

Oak Harbor 11 16 15 13 — 55

Burlington-Edison (65) — Anderson 6 2-4 17, Arendse 4 6-11 14, Montgomery 4 3-6 11, S. Clement 1 2-2 4, Stull 1 7-10 9, N.Clement 1 0-0 2, Tiscornia 0 0-0 0, Youngquist 2 0-0 4, Lott 0 0-0 0, Dillon 2 0-0 4, Stewart 0 0-0 0. Totals 21 20-33 65.

Oak Harbor (55) — Rumble 6 3-5 15, Heidt 2 6-6 12, Lobbestael 4 1-2 11, Koorn 0 0-0 0, Leach 2 4-4 9, McCardle 3 0-0 8, Pegues 0 0-0 0, Smith 0 0-0 0, Waller 0 0-0 0, Edens 0 0-0 0. Totals 17 14-17 55.

Three-point goals — Burlington-Edison 3 (Anderson 3); Oak Harbor 7 (Heidt 2, McCardle 2, Lobbestael 2, Leach).